Rockwood specializes in handling construction and demolition (C&D) materials – the tough, tricky stuff like drywall, metal, concrete, wood, cardboard, and tires.
They go beyond collecting and sorting waste; they take the stress out of the process for their customers by handling everything from Tommy carts in high-rises to LEED-certified reporting.
In everything they do, Rockwood’s focus is on diverting as much waste as possible from landfills by extracting valuable commodities. In 2023, the team’s high ambitions for reclamation, however, went beyond what they could deliver:
“We found ourselves falling short of our expectations,” says Charles Hartsell, Chief Operating Officer.
So, Rockwood decided to invest in an industrial waste shredder, which could improve the amount of value extracted as well as boost their output:
“The M&J shredder enables us to process more tonnage, meaning more business every day. We used to do 250-300 tons a day. Today, that’s up by 100 tons. That’s significant in the C&D world, ” Charles adds.
“It ate a mobile home like it was a cookie”
As part of their research to find their new shredder, Rockwood demoed and rented an M&J 4000M mobile pre-shredder and the results spoke for themselves:
“During a demo with the M&J a 16×80 mobile home with four axles was fed to the shredder. It literally ate it like a cookie. It was very, very impressive.”
Charles and his team tested other shredders, but nothing came close to the M&J 4000M:
“We researched a lot of different shredders that were on the market but none of them compared to the M&J, so the choice was clear and that’s why we own a M&J 4000. It simply outperformed the competition”, Charles says and continues:
“The M&J just seemed to do everything I needed it to. If I needed it to climb a pile, it could climb it. The speed was second to none. With others, you had to pre-sort. Not with this. If it’s in the pile, the M&J can shred it.”
Turning problem materials into profit
Enabling the Rockwood team to process up to 60% more per day was not the only benefit the team experienced after adding the M&J 4000M to their operations. The thorough size reduction allowed them to extract value from unsellable materials instead of sending it directly to landfills like others:
“We’ll push it through the shredder,” says Charles. “It gets screened, aggregate is extracted, and we mix it with woodchip to create an alternate daily cover (ADC) for landfills. This reduces internal landfill cost and is a beneficial use at landfills. We can also extract more metal and other commodities easier from the shred and screening process.”
The team even processes drywall into gypsum for farmers, reclaiming a material that’s often a landfill nightmare due to ammonia in the paper lining.
Shredded materials also mean fewer trips to the landfill and more efficient use of every truckload:
“Instead of running 16 tons, I can now send 20 tons, no problem. It’s also easier on our walking floor trailers, as there’s no more bulky stuff.”
Now, the struggle can be for the rest of the operations to keep up with the shredder:
“We keep a Caterpillar 323 totally busy trying to keep up with the machine. The M&J will outrun our screeners. It will outrun our belt. So, we have to back down a little because our other equipment just can’t keep up. “
The support sealed the deal – a real game-changer
In the investment phase as well as the daily operations, M&J’s sales and service partner for Tennessee, Thompson Machinery, has played a significant part for Rockwood:
“We already had a relationship with Thompson – they’d been through our yard, seen what we do, and understood the materials. So, when it came to investing in a shredder, dealing with them felt like going to a friend.”
After committing to the shredder, Thompson and M&J visited Rockwood to ensure the team got off to a good start:
“They came down and did an extensive training with us, so we understood how to operate it, what we were looking for, and what the settings needed to be for what we’re doing. They were just brilliant at what they were doing.”
To get on-site onboarding meant that Rockwood’s new shredder ran within a couple of hours. Since then, the shredder has been running 8-10 hours daily, with servicing intervals every 180-250 hours. Thompson Machinery has trained Rockwood’s mechanics to perform hard-facing themselves; other maintenance tasks are performed by Thompson’s service technicians:
“Servicing the M&J is straightforward. The knives are right there – no climbing into tight spaces like with other brands. And if we need help, Thompson is just 30 minutes away. If they need backup, they call Rick at M&J or connect me to the headquarters in Denmark. It’s a superior support setup and means our downtime is very small, very small,” says Charles and finishes:
“I’ve looked at other shredders and grinders. Everybody’s got a machine. But nobody has service like this. That’s been a game changer.”
